DEER HUNTING--WILD BULLS--WILD FOWL--A DUCK GUN--DRIVING AN
OX-TEAM--I REFLECT--AN ESTAMPEDE--THE TIGER CAT--RAINY
SEASON--INDIAN FIRES--WASPS--WE ARE ROBBED BY THE INDIANS--I KILL A
BEAR--CROSSING A SWOLLEN RIVER.
_Christmas, 1850._
To render agreeable a life where men are thrown entirely on their own
resources, the chief point is to ensure contentment, and nothing
conduces more to this end than to apportion to each one of the party an
equal and strictly-defined share of work. Forest life, in my case, never
altered the relations that existed between myself and those in my
employment, nor will real respect ever vanish under the familiar contact
which such a life imposes.
I gave Barnes the woods and forests, which was not such a sinecure as it
is here, as he had full employment for the winter in felling the
red-woods, and splitting them into rails for enclosing the farm. Thomas
undertook the “hewing and drawing,” the cooking, and the internal
cleanliness of the house; and this latter is very essential in mountain
life. Take everything out of your hut daily and hang it in the sun;
then, water well the floor; this drives away the vermin, which abound in
the deer and hare skins; it also ensures you against scorpions and
centipedes, which are apt to introduce themselves into the firewood. It
devolved on me to supply the larder, and the amount of exertion required
for this duty varied considerably. One day an easy walk would bring me
to a marsh, and a few shots from my double-barreled gun would secure as
many wild-ducks as we required, but on another I might be doomed, after
a long journey, to extend myself over the carcase of a buck, and then,
exposed to a glaring sun, unaided, flay my quarry and disembowel him,
quarter him, and carry him home piece by piece, over four or five miles
of successive cindery hills. I had no stout little pony with a shaggy
mane and tail, such as one sees carrying home the deer in Landseer’s
splendid pictures. I had to take as much meat as I could “pick-a-back,”
or else leave it to the coyotes, who would appear in sight whilst I was
yet at work on the carcase. If this part of a hunter’s duty was entailed
upon our fashionable deer-stalkers, many of the deer would reap the
benefit, not so much by being flayed and carried home by members of the
aristocracy, as in being left alone.
The monotony of this life was varied by excursions into the adjacent
country, and these would last two or three days; during which time we
left the hut to take care of itself; and, carrying each a rifle and a
blanket, with a few other necessaries, we passed our nights by the camp
fire, and in the day discovered wonders of nature that amply repaid us
for our journey. The first object that attracted our attention was an
immense hill of sulphur, and we discovered hot springs strongly
impregnated with this mineral in its immediate vicinity. Round one of
the springs was an apparently hard crust of sulphur, but this was
treacherous, as Thomas found out, for it was the cause of his tumbling
in and getting a medicated bath; and, although he soon dried, he smelt
so strongly of lucifer matches for some days afterwards as to be almost
unbearable. We brought some of the sulphur, which was very pure, away
with us. We also discovered large craters, and igneous rocks, piled in
such vast confusion as indicated the blind fury with which the earth had
torn and rent itself on some former great occasion. The whole of
California has been subjected to more than ordinary violent
disturbances, but the vegetation of thousands of years has decomposed
since then, and the huge rocks that were once hurled, red-hot, I dare
say, into the air, are now deeply-embedded in the surrounding soil.
These excursions opened a new field for our rifles, for, whilst taking a
bird’s-eye view one morning from the elevation on which we had encamped,
our attention was arrested by the appearance of a herd of wild cattle.
Having observed the direction in which they were grazing, and finding
that, unfortunately, the direction of the wind prevented our heading
them, I adopted a plan which proved successful. Carefully keeping them
in sight from the rear, as I knew that water was not immediately ahead
of them, I foresaw that towards sunset they would alter their course,
and, guided by their instinct, graze towards the nearest spring. This
they did in the afternoon; and having now a side wind, we hastened to
look for cover in their line of march, glad to exchange the slip-shod
pace at which for hours we had followed their movements, for a brisk
double in the other direction. As soon as we had hit our line, I sent
Barnes out to reconnoitre, and he immediately returned, having
discovered the spring and a good cover a little in advance of it. We
soon took up our positions, and before long the herd appeared in view:
five black bulls, one a young one. They were most beautiful beasts,
with sleek and glossy coats; thin in the flank, broad in the chest, and
rather short of horn. They evinced uneasiness at once when within shot,
and stared in our direction, snuffing the air and pawing the ground. As
the young one presented his broadside, he fell on his knees to
“shoulder-breaker” and, tail on end, went the rest of the herd at a long
trot over the hills. We walked up to our friend to give the “coup de
grâce,” but, through a want of caution, not usual with him, Barnes got a
bad bruise, for the bull, by a sudden exertion, rose and plunged at him,
catching him full in the chest, and knocking him down, then fell down
himself, never to rise again. Barnes felt some pain for a day or two,
which we allayed with the infallible castor oil: but I rather suspect
his chief annoyance was caused by having been floored by a young bull,
for whom, under ordinary circumstances, I think he was a match in
physical strength.
Although wild cattle are not described as being indigenous to the
country, I have no doubt, from their appearance, that these were so, and
that their cows were not many miles away. It is vexatious to be obliged
to leave a fine carcase to the wolves and vultures; but as a bullock is
too much for three men, and we were far from home, we cut out the best
part of it and returned to camp; and the coyotes made a fine noise,
during the night, over what remained.
The wild fowl now came over in heavy flights and settled in our
vicinity. The geese were in incredible numbers; white and grey geese and
brant. Of ducks we had several varieties, many of them quite unknown to
me, and I regret that I failed, from want of materials, in my endeavours
to preserve specimens of them. The geese are very easily shot when first
they arrive, but soon become very wary. The easiest and best plan is to
construct little huts of green stuff near the marshes they frequent, and
you are sure of good flight shooting at daylight. I had a large duck-gun
that I had used in punt-shooting in Norfolk, but it was very rebellious,
and kicked so, when used from the shoulder without a rest, that I placed
it under Barnes’s especial charge; and whenever he felt in particularly
good health, he went out with it, and you might see him returning with
geese and ducks suspended from every part of his body; his face wreathed
in smiles at his good fortune; but the next morning would disclose a
bruise on his right shoulder of about the size and colour of a certain
popular green dessert plate. Herons and curlew were plentiful, and very
tender, jack-snipe in great abundance, but I never disturbed them, for
I am a bad snipe shot, and the first rule in the mountains is to spare
your powder. Hares and partridges were in abundance, yet were also
spared, as we wished them about the place; but rabbits were rather
scarce and very small. If the love of sport, therefore, was sufficient
to chain one to this spot, the above enumeration will show that we had
not only ample occupation, but variety; yet I determined on adding
farming to my other amusements, and although it recurred to me that when
I gave up “gentleman farming” in England, I registered a vow to leave
such things to those who better understood them, I thought there could
be no danger in trying “an acre of maiden soil.”
It was our custom of an evening, after our supper was over, the fire
piled up with blazing oak logs, and each man had lighted his pipe and
received a noggin of schnappes, after the fatigues of the day, to
congregate in one room and there, after lighting a candle, one of us
would read a book aloud. I had a good stock of books, though they
travelled in a small compass, and as they were, for the most, by
Fielding, Smollett, De Foe, Le Sage, Goldsmith, and that class of
writers, they all bore reading twice, and more than twice; so that our
evenings were passed very sociably. Barnes, too, who was an uneducated
man, was taking instructions in writing from Thomas, and began to learn
in this wild spot what they never tried to teach him in the Christian
village where he first saw the light. One evening these amusements were
set aside for the discussion of the subject of the cultivation of a
piece of the farm. Onions were at this time commanding fabulous prices
in San Francisco; and a very simple calculation proved, as distinctly as
possible, _on paper_, that one acre planted with onions would realise an
enormous profit, provided the onions came up. To ensure this last
important point, I engineered a ditch, which was to convey water for
their irrigation from our stream; and leaving the others to carry out
these works, I started on foot for San Luis, where I arrived, after two
days, very footsore. I procured a plough, a waggon, a yoke of strong
American oxen, and a fresh supply of groceries, and I then paid a flying
visit to San Francisco in a small fishing-boat, and returned to Sonoma
with seeds of all kinds, a box of horse-radish roots, which came in very
well afterwards with wild bull, and about 500 fine young fruit-trees.
The difficulty now was to get my ox-team up to Russian River, for I knew
nothing of driving oxen. However, I took lessons from an American
teamster; and, as there are but two words of command, and each one, when
delivered, is accompanied by a crack on the head of the ox nearest to
you, I found the beasts soon recognised my voice and style of hitting.
But I had several rather impetuous streams to pass, some of which were
scarcely fordable, for the rain had set in; I was doubtful, therefore,
as to the method to be adopted in forcing my team through these. This,
my instructor informed me, could only be accomplished by “talking freely
to the oxen;” and, to my demand for a specimen, he jumped on the waggon,
and working himself into a state of apparent phrenzy, he stamped and
swore, and beat them, and cracked his whip, and execrated them until
they both broke into a round trot. I profited by his advice, and got
through my gulches in safety, and I can only hope that the “freedom of
speech” I indulged in was justified by the circumstances of the case.
I started alone, and as oxen travel very slowly, I was three days and a
half getting to the farm. On my way I met a good-looking fellow with
black beard and moustaches, who asked me in French the way to the
nearest log hut. I entered into conversation with him, and found that he
was a Normandy man of the name of Lebret. He had a gun, and a game bag,
and gaiters on; in fact, he was a “Frenchman out shooting” all over,
with nothing in his game-bag. I found that he was hard up and wanted
employment, so I told him where I was going, offered him a berth, and
with an “Eh bien!” up he jumped, and after crossing Russian River, for
which we were just in time, as it was much swollen, I landed my cargo
and Frenchman safe and sound at the farm, which, after my temporary
absence, seemed home in every sense. And it was so. The very dogs knew
it for a happy place as they bounded out to bid me welcome back. Home
speaks in the grip of Barnes’s bony hand; in the studied polish that my
rifle bears as it hangs above my bed; and home speaks in the eager faces
that group around the fire and listen to my brief recital of what befel
me since we parted.
* * * * *
I had a favourite little spot on my hunting ground that I always
selected for my halt; it was a little clump of sheltered rocks, and,
after poking about with my loading-rod, to turn out any rattlesnake that
might be there, I would sit down and enjoy the luxury of the cool shade
and a pipe. All good sportsmen agree, and with great truth, in the
impropriety of smoking whilst working up to game; but, after walking a
few hours in the hot sun, a pipe is a great luxury, and I was always
glad to reach this cover where I could indulge my propensity without
fear of tainting the surrounding atmosphere.
I have often mused, as I have sat in this little den, on the life I was
leading, and reflected with regret that its charms must some day succumb
to use, and that, in time, even deer hunting would pall on the taste,
and the excitement of a wild life become monotonous. With health beating
in every pulse, with God’s best gifts strewed round him in profusion,
and intellect to fashion them to use, a man acknowledges instinctively
the infinite wisdom of the Creator, and feels a proportionate gratitude
for His gifts.
It is easy to be grateful when one has health, strength, and freedom,
and easy to flatter oneself into the belief that a life so primitive is
more natural than one more civilised; but it is but the lazy gratitude
of one who has nothing else to live for but himself, and who is freed,
not alone from the conventionalities which a more civilised state
imposes, but from all claim upon his self-denial. Freed in fact from the
presence of all evils which beset man elsewhere, and tax his fortitude,
his courage, and his virtue; living but for himself, with himself alone
to study, he indulges in selfishness, and is happy. And this is the
great foundation-stone of the charms we hear associated with a wild free
life.
One night a herd of deer jumped our railings, and passing close to the
hut, crossed the river at great speed, evidently under the influence of
fear. We listened, and shortly afterwards heard a pack of wolves, giving
tongue in the distance. The next morning the ground, which was soft,
gave evidence that there had been an _estampede_ the night before. Herds
of deer had crossed and recrossed in every direction until they had
forded the stream, when they made a clean bolt for the mountains. Not a
hare was to be seen; and for several days we had an empty
larder,--living during that time on wheat cakes, for, unfortunately, we
had expended all our small shot. I imagine that wolves are very uncommon
in the country, from the facts of the game becoming so much excited at
their presence, and that we never heard their bark again. We did not see
a wolf, but their “sign” was unmistakeable. One day we observed the
trail of a panther near the brook, and searched for him without success;
but Barnes bagged him next day to his own gun. He was up a tree when
Barnes saw him, and came down with great rapidity on being shot through
the skull. He was a heavy beast, a male, and of a tawny colour. This
animal is called in the country the Californian lion.
The tiger cat is a beautiful animal, and very ferocious for its size;
we saw two or three of these, about the size of a wild cat, and
beautifully marked in the coat. I shot but one, and it was with the
greatest difficulty that I could induce him to resign his life without
having his skin spoilt. I was agreeably surprised, on my return one day
to the hut, to find a horse, saddled and bridled, attached to our
railing, and I ascertained that its owner was a countryman of mine who
had been “prospecting” the surrounding country, and had been directed by
March to our camp. They say we are a stiff and formal people: perhaps
so; but in the mountains, an Englishman needs no further introduction
than to know a man for a countryman to place the best he has at the
stranger’s service. You show him the river and give him a towel: you
supply him with a tin plate and spoon, and he helps himself from your
smoking pot: you produce a bottle of whiskey in his honour, and after
placing the tobacco cannister at his elbow, and pointing out the bundle
of blankets that will form his bed, you enter into social conversation.
When you part from the man the next morning, you feel quite sorry, and
hope to see him again, although there is little probability of that, for
these are chance meetings. It is my belief that there is an honest
purpose in the hearty wring of the hand that such a stray visitor gives
you as he mounts his horse to depart. Whether or no, he can’t go away
and say your rooms are _damp_, and your claret is _sour_, that your wife
is a _fright_, and your pictures are _trash_, as people _sometimes_ do
in more civilised countries, after enjoying the hospitality of their
friends. Our guest produced from his pocket, a number of Punch, and one
of the Illustrated News--about five months old. I had had opportunities
of reading these publications in a great many out-of-the-way parts of
the globe, but I never expected that they would reach my log hut. But
English periodicals creep in everywhere; and I remember that the first
indication I received of some family news of importance was when, at a
pic-nic at Mount Lebanon, I picked up a scrap of newspaper which had
contained the mustard of some party who had preceded us, and casually
glanced at its contents.
The rainy season was now approaching, and the heat became occasionally
intense. At times the Indians would fire the surrounding plains, the
long oat-straw of which would ignite for miles. The flames would advance
with great rapidity, leaving everything behind them black and charred.
At these times a dense smoke would hang over the atmosphere for two or
three days, increasing the heat until it became insupportable. I had a
thermometer with me during the whole of my stay in California, and could
produce an elaborate[6] meteorological table; but as people say you
should write as you talk, I shall dismiss the subject of the temperature
of Russian River by remarking that in summer it was sometimes as warm as
Hong Kong, and in the rainy season it was as cold as an average English
winter. We have an officer of scientific renown in our naval service,
who is selected by the Admiralty to explore the least known portions of
the globe; of which parts, when he returns, he publishes an account,
which would be interesting in the extreme, but, that, alas! his
scientific knowledge oozes out in every line, and the reader, after
hopelessly following him through a maze of figures, which are
particularly addressed to, and understood only by, the Geographical
Society, shuts the book in despair, and remains for life in ignorance of
the habits of the Chow-chow Islanders.
The Digger Indians burn the grass to enable them to get at roots and
wasps’ nests; young wasps being a luxury with them. These fires have the
good effect of destroying immense quantities of snakes and vermin; and
one can scarcely imagine the extent to which these might multiply were
they not occasionally “burnt out.” The wasps are so numerous here in
summer, as to destroy with rapidity everything they attack. Fleas not
only abound in the skins of every beast you kill, but even live on the
ground, like little herds of wild cattle; and ants are of all shapes and
sizes, and stand up savagely on their hind legs and open their mouths,
if you only look at them. The wasps attack any meat that may be hanging
up, and commence at once cutting out small pieces, which they carry
home, and it is astonishing the quantity they will carry away with them.
What they do with it when they get home, I never ascertained; but I
presumed that they “jerked” it for winter use, as the Spaniards do.
It was hard work at dinner-time, to know who the meat belonged to, for
these wasps used to sting on the slightest provocation; and it was the
worst part of Thomas’s duty to take a hare down from a peg and cut it
up.
But neither ants nor fleas ever troubled our persons; the skins were
always sent down to the river whilst yet warm, and the common
precautions I adopted in-doors insured us against all annoyance.
It now commenced to rain very heavily, but not before I had,
fortunately, completed a shed, and laid in a stock of fire-wood, and had
also erected an additional room for drying wet clothes, &c., and for
sheltering the dogs. The first rain lasted for four days without
cessation; and here again I am unable to state, scientifically, the
quantity of water that fell in inches, but on the fourth day the water
laid on our valley of such a depth that it just plummed the top of a
pair of Cording’s fishing-boots, which came up to about my knees. All
the fruit trees and garden seeds were in the ground; and as we had no
immediate use for our oxen, and they were up to their bellies in water,
we let them run over the hills. Shortly after this the weather cleared
up, and we were much distressed at missing my slot-hound. Many days
elapsed before we gained any clue to his fate, until, beating up some
new ground one day, I came upon what remained of the poor old
fellow,--his skin and bones. He had broken away and indulged in a
midnight ramble, and had evidently been attacked and overpowered by
coyotes, of which two carcasses lay near him. We all felt much regret
for the old fellow, for he was a good staunch dog, and had been a great
favourite of my late father. We buried his remains and erected a mark to
his memory; but, although I experienced the same feeling of regret that
most men do when they lose a favourite and faithful hound, I shall
refrain from inflicting upon the reader the doleful stanzas which are
generally addressed “To my Dog,” on these occasions.
_January 1._ For two months we had alternate rain and sunshine, and
nothing of moment occurred. The farm was by this time entirely enclosed,
and the _onions_ with which Barnes had planted an acre, began to appear
above the ground. We had also large patches of vegetables for home
consumption.
When returning one day from an excursion, we found that the Indians had
paid our valley a visit, and rifled our house of everything they thought
valuable; cooking utensils, blankets, clothes, and tools had
disappeared,--but we had taken the precaution of depositing our powder
in a secret place which they did not discover. Our rifles, and one
blanket each, we had with us on our excursion. The two principal
annoyances that resulted from this were, firstly, that the nights being
very cold indeed now, and our house very thin, our blankets were a
serious loss; secondly, they had stolen _all our candles_. They also
stole our skins; not that I ever intended to bring these trophies away
for the benefit of the public, for with the exception of the puma-skin,
and some of wild cats, they were of that mild description which are only
exhibited in tailors’ shop-fronts, where they assume the form of
gentlemen’s hunting inexpressibles. The Indians, it afterwards
appeared, were in the habit of annually following the course of our
stream to gather the wild grapes which grew on its banks. These people
will eat anything, but how they manage the wild grapes is a mystery, for
these grapes never ripen, and green gooseberries give no conception of
their acidity. In pursuit of these luxuries, however, they came upon our
camp, and took away whatever they thought they understood the use of,
but evidently departed in a great hurry. I never saw an Indian during
the whole of my stay in that part of the country; but, after this
robbery, had any ever come within rifle range either of my hut or
March’s, he would have been shot like a coyote; for once let an Indian
think he can steal with impunity, he will soon attempt to murder you for
the clothes on your back.
Although I had determined, after Sheldon’s casualty, upon following no
more bears into the bush, which is here too thick for the use of the
rifle, I still hoped to kill a bear during the winter, trusting to a
chance meeting under favourable circumstances; and in this respect I was
gratified, inasmuch as I killed a bear to my own gun. Now, in writing
from memory, one might almost be excused for a little inaccuracy in
point of size and weight; and I must confess that I have an almost
irresistible temptation to forget the real dimensions of the animal
that surrendered life on this occasion, and, calling it simply a _bear_,
leave its weight and ferocity to be conjectured from my general
description of the species. In fact, it was a cub, that I once found
playing by itself among some rocks. I should have liked to have taken
him home alive, but although his movements were excessively infantine
and playful to behold, I have no doubt that had I attempted to capture
him, he would not only have bitten me until I had let him go, but would
have hallooed for his parents, and brought those amiable persons to the
rescue. So I shot him; and I had quite enough to do to carry him home
dead, for he was very fat. I must mention here, that although we walked
this country for nearly nine months, and continually alighted on the
fresh “sign” of bear, with the exception of those that visited our hut
at night, and the others above mentioned, our party saw but three bears,
two of which were wounded, but escaped; and this is probably
attributable to the fact that the bear’s sense of hearing enables him to
follow up his natural impulse of avoiding the hunter.
A Colt’s revolver is invaluable to the deer-hunter, both for
self-defence and killing wounded game. Perhaps the best praise I can
award to this weapon is in saying that I have had mine for four years,
during which time it has been much used and _more abused_, but at this
moment it is perfect in every respect, and has never required repair.
We searched, or “prospected” the adjacent hills on many occasions, to
discover if gold existed in the surface soil, but without success. It is
worthy of remark, that this district of country is similar in every
respect to that of the mining regions. Here, as there, is a succession
of red gravelly hills, interspersed with veins of quartz, all of which
have been subjected to volcanic agency that would long ago have ejected
the gold from the quartz had there been any in it. But the mountain in
labour here brought forth a mouse; whilst a few miles further south it
has produced results of a much more satisfactory description. We,
however, did discover a peculiar blue quartz, which, upon assay by
fusion, was found to contain a large quantity of gold. The presence of
silver in small quantities was also evident in another rock we
discovered. But, with these exceptions, we found no trace of any
description of metal but iron.
It was now spring, and I started alone, on foot, for San Francisco,
where business required my presence. On arriving at Russian River I
found the stream much swollen, but I struck a part of the river where I
knew one of the hunters had a log-hut and a dug-out, or canoe. I reached
the hut and found no one at home, but the dug-out was hauled up and the
paddle was in it.
It was easy to launch the dug-out, which was very long and thin; so,
seating myself in the stern, I was at once in the current. I need not
say that I should never have dreamt of paddling myself over a swollen
river in a canoe, had I not accustomed myself to them when in the Borneo
rivers; but when I reached the middle of the stream I found the eddies
made the dug-out so unmanageable, and the current was so much stronger
than I imagined, and the water hissed and bubbled about me to such an
extent that I had to keep the dug-out’s head nearly straight up stream,
and I began to get quite giddy and bewildered, and wished I was safe on
shore. I did effect a landing, an hour afterwards, about a mile lower
down the river; I had just strength enough to land, and just sense
enough to feel excessively grateful for not having been carried out to
sea, or, what is more probable, capsized in the eddies of the stream.